This Middle Grade Queer Graphic Novel Will Make Its Way All The Way Into Your Heart
If you love stories of coming out, The Magic Fish is one of my absolute favourite ones. Coming out can be such a scary, sweet, and emotionally rich experience — especially when it’s your parent you’re coming out to. You wonder how it’ll change your relationship, if it’ll change it at all. When you add to that the experience of being a child to an immigrant parent with both of you navigating language barriers as well, it makes it an even more nuanced process. If that isn’t stimulating enough, there are also illustrations that are guaranteed to fill you with awe.
The Magic Fish by Trung Lê Nguyễn
This wonderful, wholesome graphic novel follows a Vietnamese mother and son duo living in America. The mother understands only a little English and Tiến understands how much he can of Vietnamese. They communicate through their love for each other and their love for fairytales. He’s 13 and has a crush on his best friend Julian, who he’s starting to feel very shy around. He would like to come out to his mother, but doesn’t even know the Vietnamese word for “gay.”
Gorgeous illustrations and fairytale retellings full of wonder show how they learn to understand each other. She tells him through one such story that she accepts and understands his identity. They share a teary embrace. This is the sweet, queer-affirming immigrant story that we’ve all been looking and waiting for. It does not have a hint of homophobia — only exploration and celebration. As a Brown queer woman, it’s the joyful representation that warms my heart and fills me with hope for the current generation of queer children.
As well as queerness is done, it also captures the immigrant experience in its richness. We see on page Tiến’s mother’s escape from post-war Vietnam and the war inside her when she returns a decade later. We see how she feels torn between the new, safe life she’s built, and her love for her family and country. She also wants her son to be more involved in her language and culture.
Considering that this is Trung Lê Capecchi-Nguyễn’s first original graphic novel, he does a beyond-stunning job. This book deserves to be seen by your eyes, stand tall on your bookshelf, be revisited often, and become a warm companion through hopeful and hopeless days. I hope you pick it up and it means to you what it has meant to me. I hope it helps you dream a kinder world into existence by watching it on the page.
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